Examining the Emergence of Feminist Consciousness in the Select Fiction of Contemporary North East Women Writers

Rupkatha Journal on Interdisciplinary Studies in Humanities (ISSN 0975-2935) Indexed by Web of Science, Scopus, DOAJ, ERIHPLUS Special Conference Issue (Vol. 12, No. 5, 2020. 1-7) from 1st Rupkatha International Open Conference on Recent Advances in Interdisciplinary Humanities (rioc.rupkatha.com) Full Text: http://rupkatha.com/V12/n5/rioc1s17n4.pdf DOI: https://dx.doi.org/10.21659/rupkatha.v12n5.rioc1s17n4 Examining the Emergence of Feminist Consciousness in the Select Fiction of Contemporary North East Women Writers Adenuo Shirat Luikham Assistant Professor, Department of English, Don Bosco College Kohima, Nagaland, India. Email: [email protected]. ORCID: 0000-0003-4273-3117. Abstract An interesting development in the literary world in India in the last few decades is the emergence of writings in English from the North East. This development is simultaneously accompanied with a growing interest in the region’s writings and its people especially from mainland India. It is also noteworthy that many of the contemporary writers contributing to this nascent literary tradition are women. While the quality of any writing cannot be overshadowed or judged by gender, it is irrefutable that women write from a position where their gender often dictates their experiences. For contemporary women writers of the North East, their narratives, seated in the vehicle of fiction, become a revelation on the gendered experiences of women from the region whose issues, concerns and problems are often shrouded in a cloud of mystery and exoticized by the outside world. The paper seeks to examine the select fiction of women writers from the region and state that there is a discernible feminist consciousness that is emerging; identifying these feminist markers in their fiction allows the silenced voices of women to be heard and their growing boldness to claim a dignified existence in the midst of convoluted geo-politics that have irrevocably scarred the region. Keywords: North East, Feminist Consciousness, Contemporary Women Writers, Fiction from the North East Introduction The North East region of India is a complex synthesis and amalgamation of heterogeneous population with multiethnic and multilingual cultures and this is clearly reflected in its literature. In contemporary times, there has been a sharp increase in publications from the region written in English especially in the genre of fiction (novels and short stories). A few reasons for this exponential growth can be attributed to: an increased interest in the region’s varied cultures which also translates to an interest in its literature; increase in local publishing houses giving more opportunities to up and coming writers; and the aspect of viewing these writings as ‘exotic’ is at play and it piques the interests of a wider readership which transcends geographical boundaries. It is should be noted that the umbrella term ‘North East’ and its application to literature from the region is contentious and problematic given that the coinage of the term was mainly for use in administrative purposes during the British rule which meant the importance of recognising © AesthetixMS 2020. This Open Access article is published under a Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/), which permits non-commercial re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. For citation use the DOI. For commercial re-use, please contact [email protected]. 2 Rupkatha Journal, Vol. 12, No. 5, 2020 the cultural diversity of each of the eight states that make up the North East was not a primary concern for the administrators. As problematic as the term is, the tag, at present, works to the advantage of writers from the region, as it gives them the necessary spotlight especially since a literary tradition of works written in English is still in its nascent stage. In the surge of literature from the North-East, many contemporary works are by women writers. This is a notable development and should be highlighted. Literature and narratives about the region have so far been presented from the viewpoint of the ‘outsider’ and is androcentric. Concurrently geo-political issues have ravaged the region since the formation of the states that comprises the North East; this has undoubtedly affected the different populations in each state. These issues have given rise to many concerns that have negatively impacted women and children, however, their experiences are silenced due to the androcentrism of the narratives that trickle out to the mainland. These contemporary North East women writers are therefore essential, if not, necessary mouth pieces that give voice to the experiences of women from all walks of life through their literary works. In the select fiction of contemporary North East women writers that the paper has confined itself to, though these writers belong to different ethnic communities, they possess the commonality of shared experiences that are unique to the region. Some may even call it distinctly ‘north eastern’ and in articulating this distinctness through the lens of female experience, there is a discernible feminist consciousness that is emerging. Defining Feminist Consciousness in the Context of North East Women Writers The word ‘feminist’ in this context is used according to Toril Moi’s definition of referring to “writing which takes a discernible anti-patriarchal and anti-sexist position,” so the term ‘feminist consciousness’ is used to refer to a state of awareness of the self and the situation of belonging to a gender and the concerns that comes along with belonging to that gender (132). Another definition for the term according to historian and feminist author Gerda Lerner in The Creation of Feminist Consciousness: From the Middle Ages to Eighteen-Seventy (1993) is: (1)The awareness of women that they belong to a subordinate group and that, as members of such a group, they have suffered wrongs; (2) The recognition that their subordination is not natural, but societally determined; (3) The development of a sense of sisterhood; (4) the autonomous definition by women of their goals and strategies for changing their condition; and (5) the development of an alternate vision of the future. (274) Women authors therefore invariably articulate the female experience because the very building blocks of their craft stems from the cognisance that they have been oppressed throughout history and continue to battle age-old systems of oppression. This validates the notion that Christiane Rochefort puts forth in “Privilege of Consciousness” where she writes that women’s literature in itself should be considered as a “specific category, not because of biology, but because it is, in a sense, the literature of the colonized” (qtd. in “Feminist Criticism in the Wilderness”, Showalter 339). Lerner also substantiates this statement by reiterating the significance of examining women’s experiences in its own terms, she writes: Women have been left out of history not because of the evil conspiracies of men in general or male historians in particular, but because we have considered history only in male- centred terms…. To rectify this, and to light up areas of historical darkness we must, for a time, focus on women-centred inquiry …. History must include an account of the female experience over time and include the development of feminist consciousness as an 3 Examining the Emergence of Feminist Consciousness in the Select Fiction of Contemporary North East Women Writers essential aspect of women’s past. (qtd. in “Feminist Criticism in the Wilderness”, Showalter 339-40) Consequently, creativity becomes a vehicle and instrument by which women can emancipate themselves, intellectually, to a level from which they can climb out of the confines of the structures of patriarchal hierarchy (Feminist Consciousness, Lerner 275). From the North East, with the exception of Assamese writer Indira Goswami, whose novels primarily focus on women’s issues, gender relations, and the constraints of patriarchal societies on women, there is still a dearth of contemporary women writers who write exclusively on the woman question. That being said, since “writers necessarily articulate gendered experiences,” all writing by women is invariably marked by gender and in the very act of writing, women writers from the region raise the consciousness of women themselves and give insights into female sensibilities (Ostriker 9). In the North East, except the Khasi matrilineal system, majority of the ethnic communities follow a strongly patriarchal set up; instances of discrimination and oppression against women are not difficult to find. Women writers also inhabit this gendered space in their patriarchal societies and therefore their writings inevitably reflect the exploitation and marginalization they experience. The fiction of contemporary North East women writers are not overtly feminist but it reflects a self-awareness of being a woman in a patriarchal society. This awareness translates into the emergence of a feminist consciousness when examining the select texts which are discussed in the paper. The following texts offer insights into the self-awareness of being female and consequently become a voice for the varied female experiences from the North East. Easterine Kire, who is from Nagaland, in her novel The Terrible Matriarchy, projects her female experience through the character Dieleno who faces gender discrimination. In Rebirth, by Jahnavi Barua, the protagonist has to confront many systematic prejudices and oppression as a woman, and through the character’s experiences the writer assumes a voice that speaks out against patriarchy. Kire’s A Terrible Matriarchy Kire’s novel which was published in 2007 is a notable because it is one of the first texts to have addressed the issue of a Naga woman’s place in a male dominated society. Kire’s story is set in a Nagaland and delves into the life of a young girl, Dieleno, who is from the Angami tribe (one of the major tribes of the state).

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